Playing with Piecing

Nuthatch

I want a quilt block featuring a Nuthatch; so I drew this sketch of a Nuthatch on a tree branch.

The Nuthatch looks fine but the tree looks like a telephone pole with a fake branch nailed to it.

What if I lose the tree and redraw the branch?

This is more convincing and the composition is better as well.

I need to divide the drawing into sew-able pieces.  I'll use green for my first seam lines.

I'm going to stitch the eye and beak; so I'll show them in orange.

What if I place the Nuthatch in a box?

What if I split the branch where it forks?

The branch is taken care of I just need to finish piecing the bird.

What if I place a seam at the base of the wing?

This results in a small triangle that could be hard to sew.

What if I make the triangle larger?

I'll go with this. I'd rather sew two medium sized triangles than one small one.

I'm happy.  Facing downward like this is the Nuthatche's most natural position.  I can almost hear him softly calling yank yank yank.





For more pieced critters go to My Posts by Subject in the sidebar on the right and click on Birds.